Red-handed
by rubirosas
Summary: The Schraders have been married six months and Hank is still learning things about his wife. (Pre-series, takes place in the same universe as mrstater's fic "Between Me and My Sister")


The apartment door squeaks no matter how gingerly he pushes it open and Hank squints with tired annoyance as he goes in. He's not delicate by any means but he always tries to be quiet when he comes home late, on account of Marie. Must have treated the hinges with WD-40 at least three or four times, only it never seems to work and of course the damned super is never around.

The building itself is a real shithole but Marie calls their little one-bedroom a "fixer upper"-or as she whispered to him the night they first moved in, "a prelude to more luxurious living." She's always putting a positive spin on things, always trying to make things better, make him better, and Hank still can't believe he's married to her. He normally laughs off her attempts to make their little apartment, their little life sound much grander than it is, but the truth is, he usually appreciates it more than he knows how to say.

It makes the overtime shifts at work followed by late nights at Central New Mexico Community College worth it. He knows that one day, they'll have something bigger than this, that they built together, but nights like tonight, when he just wants to put some Visine in his overworked, dry eyes and go to bed, it's not always easy to see the end game. Instead of seeing the future, Hank sees the dripping bathroom faucet, the roach trap by the baseboard, the-

_Drawerful of shiny, unopened and from the looks of it __**expensive**__ cosmetics?_

"The fuck?"

He can't find the goddamn Visine, so he's pulling drawers open, even Marie's, the ones he never bothers looking in for all the frilly shit she keeps everywhere, but it takes him two seconds to realize what this drawer is. _Her stash._

Hank swallows, feels the bile rise in his throat. Clearly this wasn't a one-time deal as he'd originally thought the day he'd met her-when he'd _booked her_ for shoplifting. Plenty of pretty, mostly well-adjusted women get picked up for shoplifting. They're usually just bored, looking for a cheap thrill. That's what he assumed about Marie and after they hit it off, he'd put it behind him as a case of "everyone makes mistakes." But this...

_This_ is different. And what bothers him more than anything is the fact that they've been married half a year and he's been completely in the dark about it.

_It._

There's a name, he knows. _Kleptomania._ Hank's taking a psychology class right now and has learned a little about it, plus there's what he's seen on the job—usually junkies and fire starters who can't resist the compulsion to steal. For a moment he wonders if Marie has some co-condition (Jesus Christ) that she's hiding. Surely a narcotics officer would notice if his wife was using drugs, wouldn't he? Yet he'd missed this.

He stares down at the open drawer for a long moment, his eyesight now painfully strained, trying to puzzle out his next course of action. Before Hank can make up his mind, Marie does it for him. She sweeps into the doorway (how she manages to _sweep _and _glide_ in their little apartment, he'll never know) in her purple bathrobe, purple sleep mask pushed up on her forehead, looks from him to the open drawer, then back to him, and _glares._

"What're you doing in _MY_ drawer?" she demands with an imperious tone Hank doesn't recognize. "Those are _MY_ things." But her voice is shaking at the end of her second sentence—he notices that, at least.

"Yeah?" Hank asks without missing a beat. "I thought they were Macy's-or Walgreens'-things."

"What would you know about it?" Marie retorts, looking away as her features start to crumple.

"I'm not an idiot, Marie," Hank says, but his voice is gentler—she's been his weakness since the moment they met, and all it takes is a hint that she might be falling apart for him to soften.

"I just—I—I need them," Marie says quietly as tears start to fall down her cheeks.

"Why?" he wants to know. His hand rests on the bathroom sink and he knows he should press it to the small of her back, offer her some sort of comfort, but he can't just yet.

"I—I don't know. I feel better—when I—when—I don't—want to talk about it, Hank." She hugs herself.

He should demand she talk about it, nip it in the fucking bud before it gets any worse—but there's a look in Marie's eyes that stops him. It scares him the way she folds in on herself, like she could just keep shrinking from him until there's nothing more of her left.

"Just—just—don't do it anymore," he mutters right before Marie throws her arms around him and presses her face to his broad chest..

"I won't," she says very quietly.

They both know she's lying.


End file.
